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Annoyed. Bored. Tired. The strongest. The four major components that currently made up Gojo Satoru’s being.
He peered down at the lively night market hundreds of feet below. Vendors advertising their wares, couples laughing, children crying, all of it blending into a uniform drone where Gojo sat perched on top of a water tower.
Three reptilian curses shoved their mangled snouts through a sewer grate, unable to resist the cacophony of human emotions. A vague blink in their direction reduced all three to dust.
None of the spirits here were even remotely strong, but they were in such number and so spread out that it made for tedious and irritating work.
Gojo collapsed on his back. Five consecutive days of this had left him bone tired. He knew jujutsu societies were always understaffed but it was as if no one had been assigned to clear this entire prefecture in a decade. Just because he could get it done fastest was hardly justification for sending the strongest shaman in existence for janitorial duty.
God, he could not wait to get back to the luxurious bed of his very posh hotel and disappear into the downy covers.
Except, Gojo pulled out his phone and looked at the 1:21am staring at him along with the date, tonight was his student’s solo field assessments. No sweet embrace of unconsciousness quite yet.
He had raised hell when the higher ups assigned him on an extended mission to Hokkaido when his students would be going on their first remote assignments far from any backup. Honestly, after what happened the last time he’d been on a foreign mission when his students had been dispatched could anyone blame him?
Well, the higher ups certainly could. Though to be fair, which Gojo was extremely disinclined to being, it was impossible to know if the elders were irritated because he was nearly an hour late, had inhaled two boxes of colorful macarons during the meeting, or because he continuously made vague threats should they compromise his student safety.
With only a combined thirty-two fulminations from both sides, two aneurysms, and four separate individuals swallowing blood pressure medication, he was assured the second years would be supervising.
“If any of your students should prove to be so incompetent as to need another sorcerer to do their job for them, we’ll have to seriously reconsider their grade assignment and your-”
“Yeah yeah.” He waved a hand lazily, already turning to exit the meeting room. “As long as their assignment info is correct, there’s nothing they can’t handle” He tilted his head to peer at the panel of elders over the side of his shade, letting the silence stretch just past comfort.
“Plus! They have the world’s greatest teacher, they’ll blow the first year field solo records out of the water!”
A part of him was now wishing he had held firm and told all the old coots to fuck off.
Not because he didn’t trust Panda, Maki, and Toge with his cute first years, but because it landed him on this miserable job. It was likely going to take another day to finish combing through and exterminating the Obihiro area he thought with a groan. He was going to buy enough Ragueneau Inochi apple cakes on the return trip through Aomori to give an army diabetes.
A buzz brought Gojo’s attention back to his phone.
From: Inumaki Toge
*A video showing a fluffy white cat falling asleep and tumbling off a couch.*
*Gojo Satoru laugh reacted to “video”*
From: You
I see my cute first years are handling their solos so well you aren’t even paying attention supervising 😉
From: Inumaki Toge
?
Maki, Panda and I are in Shinjuku. Were we supposed to be with the first years? (•ิ_•ิ)?
Gojo felt something heavy settle in his stomach. Toge’s message meant two things. One, all his students were hundreds of kilometers away from help in every direction. Two, someone had lied to him.
Overreacting, that’s what he was doing, he tried to convince himself as he tapped on the trouble magnet’s number in his contacts. His heart beat an agitated rhythm between every electronic ring, fingers tightening dangerously on his very expensive phone.
“Gojo sensei?” Gojo audibly exhaled as Yuuji’s confused but jovial voice sounded over the speaker. “Is everything okay? I thought you’re still in Hokkaido.”
“I am! In Chitose to be precise, but I’m just sooo excited for my precious student’s midterm field solo I had to call! How’s it going? Already done?” He hoped he was projecting a perfectly normal amount of obnoxious cheer. He heard a phone being shuffled onto a shoulder and a polite
“Thanks for the ride!” before Yuuji replied
“Ah just got here actually. Driver was late getting me from the station, but I don’t mind. It’s kind of nostalgic being back in Sendai. If there’s time I might go visit grandpa.” In the background Gojo could hear the incantation for a veil being drawn. “Isn’t that area famous for dairy? Are you gonna bring us back souvenirs? Oh cheese tarts! I’ve always wanted to try Hokkaido cheese tarts!”
Gojo laughed, the weight completely vanishing from his gut.
“I’ll bring back lots of cheese tarts.” He promised. “Buuuut~ If Yuuji fails his field solo I’ll be eating your portion of the sweets.” There was an indignant squawk.
“It’s just three grade twos. I’ll exorcise them, pay respects to grandpa, and still be back in time to eat Kugisaki’s share. Ah gotta go sensei, remember the tarts!” The call disconnected with a click.
Definitely overreacting, if he wasn’t careful someone was going to accuse him of being a mother hen.
The smartphone made a little buzz of protest as Gojo went to slip it back into his pocket. He frowned at the new notification. The little red (1) above his text message app challenging his peace. He tapped the icon
From: Kugisaki Nobara
SOS
A map with a little moving blue dot indicated she had turned on GPS location share.
The weight was back in his stomach and it brought a friend. Shit. The map showed an alleyway in Iwate, almost 400 kilometers away. To try warping to her would be at the edge of his considerable limits, but he’d be damned if he was going to attend one of his kid’s funeral this week. Nothing but to do it.
From: You
OMW
When he appeared on a rooftop a block away from the veil with only mild vertigo, Gojo counted it as a massive win.
A hand reached to tug his blindfold down and let his Six Eyes assess the scene. A veil, but no sign of its caster or any other sorcerer other than Nobara in the vicinity. He took in the weaves of cursed energy in the veil, designed to lock curses and his student in and keep other sorcerers out, but it would hardly hinder him.
He turned his attention to the twisting alleyway. Inside the barrier was a nightmare for a ranged fighter.
Hundreds of low grade cursed spirits swarmed the buildings and streets form every direction. Their number and nature exceeded anything that could occur in the region, practically blanketing the block forcing Nobara into a hasty retreat. She was cornered at the limits of the veil in an alleyway, with six story buildings on either side and pockets long empty of nails. A ring of safety was barely being maintained with large swings of her curse energy imbued hammer.
Time to end this.
Gojo tore through the veil like paper, landing in front of Nobara with a violent blast of cursed energy. It was unrefined, but got the job done well enough as bits of dust and blood rained down on the pair from the obliterated curses. There was a repulsed cough behind him
“Gross.” Nobara shook her head, trying to dislodge the bits that had landed on her hair “Up top!”
Gojo looked up as a living wave of spirits crested over the apartment roofs, appendages crushing and tangling in their haste for prey. Gojo raised a hand, framing the cascade of ugly creatures in one palm before closing them in a fist. Ghastly screams rent the night as dozens of spirits exploded in a macabre painting above them.
Nobara made a noise of disgust as even more gore fell onto her hair and uniform. Infinity kept Gojo’s own appearance immaculate, a fact his student looked ready to curse him for.
“This wasn’t what I was told ok!? It was suppose to be just a couple grade twos." She raged, hands shaking as they wrestled a viscous green chunk from her hair. "I can’t believe I got had by a metric fuckton of small fry. I swear if I fail my midterms because of this I’m calling bullshit. This-”. Gojo held up a placating hand.
“You didn’t fail. Someone set you up, and trust me,” He gave her a careful once over. There were a few cuts on her arm, a larger wound on her left calf that would need bandaging, and she had somehow lost both her shoes, but seemed otherwise alright “I will find out who”
“You better.” She let out a shaky breath and tucked her hammer away at her belt. “I’m gonna beat their ass with you when you find out. And uh, thanks.” She grumbled, staring at a bloodstain on her sock. “For coming.”
Gojo grinned, patting her shoulder.
“Anything for my adorable little first years. But if I’m right, and unfortunately I always am, we aren't quite done yet.” As if the universe heard him there came a buzz from his pocket.
From: Fushiguro Megumi
Hwlp
Damnit. A puzzle was falling into place that stoked a rare emotion in him, rage.
Gojo jabbed the call button a little too hard.
Beep – beep – beep – sorry, the number you called is not available. At the tone please record a mes-
“Nobara, do you know where Megumi was assigned tonight?” She was frowning at his phone but glanced up at the question with steel in her eyes.
“I’m not sure exactly. Somewhere outside Yamagata city. I remember him saying it was close to a shrine when he looked it up.” Gojo had to avoid grimacing, but what was another 200-kilometer jump when he’s already traveled half the country.
“We’ll just have to find him when we get there. Hold on”
In a dizzying blur of green trees and gray concrete Gojo deposited them both on the tip of a slated roof top.
He heard a scream and felt two hands clench into fists on his back.
“Holy shit. What the fuck sensei.” She peaked out behind Gojo's back at the sprawling mountainside and gleaming city lights miles below her. “Are we on top of the Yamadera!?”
Gojo was too busy closing his eyes and willing the dizziness to go away. If his head didn’t like what he just pulled off, it definitely was not going to like what he was about to do next.
He braced himself as he opened his eyes, overriding the meticulous filtering system his brain had built up over the years to take in every possible scrap of info from the vast expanse of space. A small, probably reasonable, voice in his head told him what he was doing was stupid.
A much louder voice screamed at himself to shut up and find Megumi right. Fucking. Now.
A million pinpricks of light, energies, vectors, and curses vied for his attention. Each was fastidiously assessed then discarded just as quickly. None of it was what he was looking for.
He forced himself to systematically scan across the city, into the clusters of farms and villages dotting the mountainside roads.
“Sensei…are you, uh-you ok?” Two of Kugisaki’s nails were driving themselves into his retinas now, but he was so close. There! A familiar burn of cursed energy with a flash of lightening that could only be from Nue.
“Found him.” That was the only warning Nobara got before their feet were no longer touching the shrine’s tiles and were instead firmly planted on a narrow dirt path nestled between tiered rice field. Rather, Nobara’s feet were firmly planted while Gojo’s stumbled as his body tried to equilibrate somewhere far left to where his center of gravity was. Kugisaki’s eyes narrowed but before her lips could even part Gojo gave a cheery wave as he righted himself.
“Ah. Didn’t quite place us on even ground I see.” She raised an unimpressed eyebrow at the bold-faced lie, but before she could challenge him a roar sent pebbles skittering across the earth.
The curse was easily over 30 meters tall, vaguely humanoid but composed entirely of a dark brown sludge that roiled into gnashing jaws before collapsing back into itself. Above, Nue made a diving pass, tearing off a chunk of what qualified for the head and flinging it away. The sludge splattered onto the nearby trees, corroding the greenery it touched into a smoking grey. The viscous attack didn’t even slow the curse, the jagged hole already collapsing in on itself to reform a dripping maw.
Megumi was nowhere in sight.
“Fushiguro!” Nobara screamed, hands cupped around her mouth. “You better not be dead. I’ll kill you myself.” Her foot tapped rapidly in agitation.
Gojo’s breath halted, every passing second without an answering call pressed into his sternum like an anvil.
“Kugisaki!” The voice was wheezy but most certainly alive. Nobara wasted no time making a beeline towards the trees where the call came from while Gojo focused his attention on the grade one. The curse heaved its massive body forward, mouth splitting wide enough to swallow a paddy field.
Gojo pushed aside the crescendoing headache and ignited the rage he’d been pressing down.
He raised his left hand pushing cursed energy onto the tip of his index finger. The swirling energy coalesce into a black sphere then refine itself into a marble of glowing red.
The bulk of the curse blotted out the night sky. He waited for the filthy thing to press itself close enough to touch. Waited for the dripping slime to sizzle the blades of grass beside his feet and the acrid smoke to waft into his nose before-
Cursed Technique Reversal: Red
The blast tore through where the curse’s body use to occupy, its form twisting at unnatural angles as space itself was torn apart. When the smoke cleared the only thing that remained was a few scattered puddles of brown scum that quickly dissolved into the wind.
The landscape tilted violently as the murky rice fields lurched into his face, the black of the night sky and dirt road becoming indistinguishable. Gojo managed to right his balance with zero undignified arm flailing involved. There wasn’t time for this.
He sprinted in the straightest line he could manage to where Nobara had disappeared moments before. He heard the pair before he saw them.
“Where did your shoes go?”
“Shut up. At least I remembered to keep my bones where they belong.”
“At least I remembered to bring first aid supplies.” Was the sulky reply.
“Cause you and Itadori always end up needing them.” Gojo slid down an incline towards where the bickering voices drifted.
Megumi had hidden himself in a depression below a half up-rooted tree. Nobara was crouched in front of her classmate, carefully winding bandage strips through his hair while Megumi tended to her leg wound.
The teen’s face was pale and beaded with sweat, contrasting sharply with the wild mural of scratches that looked as though someone clubbed his face with a tree. Most concerning was the clearly broken left leg that lay twisted at a sickening angle in the dirt, the surrounding cloth had burned away leaving swaths of puckered red skin.
Gojo gave a low whistle as he squat down a few feet in front of his irritated student.
“You look like shit.” He said with a forced smirk. Megumi leveled an impressive glare at his teacher, but much to Gojo’s horror instead of the customary request for him to cease and desist, the dark eyes narrowed sharply.
“So do you.” Fuck, the kid was always dangerously perceptive at the most inopportune times. Gojo brought a hand to dramatically to clutch at his chest instead of responding to the subtle challenge.
“Impossible! I always look incredible. Nobara you should check poor Megumi’s eyes.”
“My eyes are fine.” He snapped, uncharacteristically irate. “What the hell is going on with-”
“This is going to hurt like a bitch” Gojo did not pick favorites, but Nobara was currently his favorite. She had lined up a branch next to the mangled limb and was eyeing it dubiously. Megumi mercifully turned his attention away to examine the break.
“Just do it.” Despite the resolute words, his grip was bone white. Gojo could hear Nobara mutter curses as she tried to still adrenaline shaken hands.
She blew out a steadying breath, braced her hands above and below the gash and pushed. Megumi choked on an aborted gasp, shoulder hunching in on themselves as he curled over the leg. Gojo's frame seized in sympathy. He shifted closer to brace a hand on his student's shoulder, trying to provide a tactile distraction. With his other hand he fished out his phone, fingers tapping Yuuji’s name. The dial tone rang tauntingly in one ear while Megumi’s uneven breaths filled the other.
Pick up. Pick up. Pick up. Pick up.
“Sensei.” Yuuji gasped, out of breath. Behind was the unmistakable sound of glass shattering.
“Where are you?” Megumi and Nobara were both looking at him intently now.
“An abandoned mall.” There was an earsplitting shriek and the echo of several metal racks crashing into each other. “Somethings really wrong sensei. Are Fushiguro and Kugisaki ok?”
“They’re with me. This whole field assessment was a setup, give me the address, we’re heading to your location.” Yuuji managed to rattle off the address as rubber soles made a mad dash across linoleum floors. Gojo hung up with an affirmative. He tightened his hand on Megumi’s shoulder.
“Can you stand?”
“We’re coming with you.” Megumi said in lieu of an answer. When did the kid pick up so many bad habits from him?
It was shaky, but with Nobara’s help, Megumi managed to remain upright at the cost of his complexion shifting from pale to paper white. In one motion Gojo brought himself fully upright. The horizon remained a flat line and his headache lingered at the same stabbing level. Good.
That unsettling assessing look was back in Megumi’s eyes, but Gojo thoroughly ignored it in favor of looping an arm over each of his student’s shoulder.
“Brace yourselves.” He was going to regret this in the morning.
Never mind the morning, Gojo regretted everything now. It took conscious effort to stop himself from pressing his knuckles into aching eyes for any hope of relief.
The jump was precise though. All three sorcerers stood in an empty parking lot barely a foot away from the inky veil. A cursory glance told Gojo it was nearly identical to the one cast over Nobara, designed to keep curses and sorcerers in while locking others out. The domed structure crumpled just as easily as the first when Gojo pressed a finger to it.
“You two stay here”. The two identical scowls he received was predictable.
“You can’t honestly expect us to do that.” Megumi said in a deadpan while Nobara raised an eyebrow that conveyed exactly how stupid she felt the order was.
“Look. Neither of you are in any condition to be fighting.” He reasoned. Megumi looked him dead in the eye.
“Hypocrite.” The brat. If someone wasn’t using his skull as a percussion Gojo might have felt offended.
“Nonsense! Have a little faith in your teacher to rescue our little Yuuji. I’m the strongest after all.” He added a wink and the widest grin he could muster for effect.
Two completely unimpressed faces blinked back.
“Fine.” He thew his hands up in defeat. “5 minutes. If we aren’t out by then you two can play knight in shining armor.” The two exchanged a conversation with a glance before nodding. “Good.” He turned with finality.
Gojo narrowed his focus on the flow of cursed energy in the building as his feet ate up the asphalt to the glass door entrance. It would have been preferable to simply warp the last short bit of distance, but it was a real 50/50 between him landing heroically right in front Yuuji or lodging himself into a vending machine.
He burst through the double doors onto a second story food court. The building was barely lit by scattered fluorescent lights that sputtered in and out at a nauseating frequency. Sounds of battle echoed from the foyer a floor below.
Gojo took a running jump off the balcony just in time to see Yuuji being used as a human wrecking ball to obliterate the fountain centerpiece. His student crashed into a store shutter with enough force to dent the metal.
Yuuji’s normally fluffy pink hair was matted down with blood, copious amounts dripping over his swollen right eye to splatter on pristine white floors. Two of his left fingers were broken and a section of uniform fabric was stained maroon. Despite the injuries Yuuji was instantly struggling to rise into a fighting stance.
“Yo!” Gojo called out before landing a few paces in front of the kid, obstructing him from the three curses regrouping on the other side of the rubble.
Two semi-grade one curses circled to flank them on either side. One an emaciated monkey whose lower jaw dangled almost to the floor, barely clinging on by shredded strands of murky green skin. The other a worm like monster with human hands in place of feet to wriggle it forward.
However, neither of the unsightly creatures held Gojo’s attention. A shadow sketched into the shape of a child crouched in a fetal position, skin pale and devoid of any features. Pitch black circles blinked in and out of existence at random across the curse’s body. It was toeing the line of special grade as it poured out enough curse energy to dwarf the sickly wavelengths from its two companions.
That thing could become a problem if the fight drew out. He needed to end things quickly.
The centipede cooperated by deciding to launch itself forward. The circle of fangs that was its mouth unfurled to spew a torrent of purple gas.
Gojo brought his hands together in a crisp clap sending a shockwave that blew the fumes back and ripped the curse into two bloody halves.
He glanced back at Yuuji who was now standing, beaming at his teacher with a smile to rival the sun.
“You good to keep going?” Blue bursts of cursed energy ignited on Yuuji’s fists in response. That’s my kid Gojo thought brightly. “You handle the freaky nutcracker over there.” He aimed a finger gun at the monkey curse ambling towards them, its jaw snapping up with a hair-raising clack before falling like a reverse guillotine.
In a blink Yuuji launched himself at his opponent, cursed energy imbued fist sending it flying through a display window.
Gojo rested his Six Eyes back on the child. The curse stayed completely stationary even as Gojo advanced, bringing two fingers up to form a mudra.
The air crackled and burned as cursed energy condensed into a nidus of destruction. He’ll end this entire farce of a night in one strike. The unmoving curse hovered barely ten feet away, Yuuji was far enough to not be caught in the blast, Gojo brought his hand forward, and everything went wrong.
The twitching black discs all vanished from the curse’s body, reappearing suspended in the air surrounding the sorcerer, shit.
A spike of cursed energy was his only warning as piercing screams blasted in every direction. Gojo lost the grip on his technique as his hands reflexively tried to block the agonizing noise from his ears. But the screams weren’t just in the air, they reverberated in his skull unhindered, choking away coherence. Focus, he needed to focus, his students were relying on him.
Gojo forced his eyes open – when had they closed? – a bloody gash of a smile widened a hairs breadth away. The curse’s putrid breath mixed with his own, its forehead prevented from touching by the bare sliver of infinity between them.
Gojo only had a moment to register shocked alarm before the curse pulled back. Hundreds of black spheres fanned out behind it, gaining color as they formed the eyes of a peacock tail.
In mesmerized horror, wide blue eyes watched hundreds of ocelli blink open in synchrony, exploding into a blazing kaleidoscope of shapes and colors.
The pain was blinding and absolute. He couldn’t see. Couldn’t think. It was impossible to tell if his eyes were open or closed when vision had been replaced by the burn of hot iron nails.
A foot made contact with his diaphragm, forcing air from his lungs and crushing his back into a support pillar. His mind scrambled blindly for purchase, reaching desperately to restore Infinity.
There wasn’t enough time, the revolting flare of cursed energy was right in front of him.
“Nue!” The shikigami slammed into its opponent leaving only the taste of ozone in its wing’s wake.
“Fushiguro! Kugisaki!” A flare of familiar cursed energy from his students and the dispersal of a foreign one signaled the exorcism of the monkey curse. “Somethings wrong with Gojo-sensei!” Gojo hated the panic in Yuuji’s voice, even more so to be the cause of it.
“We can see that!” Nobara’s voice was accompanied by the ring of metal striking rock. An inhuman shriek of pain rang out as the weaponized debris found its mark. Rubber soles squeaked across the floor accompanied by the flap of wings as Yuuji and Megumi’s shikigami joined the fray. Every time the beginning of the curse’s scream began to manifest it was cut off by a crackle of electricity or fists digging into flesh. The monster stumbled back, fanning its cursed energy out behind once more.
“Don’t look at it!” Yuuji cried in warning.
“Over here, Nue cover us.” He heard his student leap back and the rustle of wings settle over them as a second explosion of cursed energy lit up his frazzled senses.
Gojo refused to be dead weight as his student risked their lives. With a slash of one hand in the curse’s general direction, he sent a surge of raw power tearing through space. The sound of rending flesh and the wet squelch of limbs smeared upon walls was his reward.
Yuuji leapt on the opening, darting forward to grab the curse. He threw the creature hard enough to shatter floor tiles.
Nobara’s hammer ground shards of shrapnel into the curse’s body, pinning it in place.
“Divine dog: Totality.” With a howl and snap of teeth the curse dissipated into the stagnant air. There were no jubilant cries of victory, only an uneven scramble of feet as all three students hobbled over to hover around him like anxious hummingbirds.
“What happened?” Megumi fought hard to keep his voice even, but a distressed edge was bleeding in.
“I-I’m not sure, that curse didn’t even move before sensei showed up. I think it surprised him with the scream thing, then it did the weird peacock light attack, it was like a supernova in here, and, and” Yuuji’s words spilled out in a panicked jumble. “Gojo-sensei just collapsed. The curse kicked him. Like actually made contact kicked him.”
Yuuji breathed the last sentence in a tone people used to let a mother know her son had died.
Gojo needed to get up.
He needed to get it together and reassure his student. Shrug this off with a smile like the cocky, immutable pillar of strength they needed. But his limbs refused to cooperate, his perception scrambled in vain to organize, everything was too much. His palms crushed themselves against eyes squeezed shut, hoping for a reprieve that would not come.
“I think I might know what’s going on.” Megumi said hesitantly. “When I use to live with him, sometimes, after missions he’d…” the boy’s voice trailed off in uncertainty but when he spoke again the tone was firm.
“Kugisaki can you kill the lights?”
“On it.” With a couple strikes of her hammer dozens of flickering fluorescent lights shattered.
Megumi was saying something else, but the words faded beneath the roaring pulse of blood between Gojo’s ears. The sorcerer was rapidly losing a battle against his own body. Each shallow breath seized in his chest, his own traitorous gift stabbing agony into his brain.
It hurt. He couldn’t breath. This was pathetic. He was pathe-
a warm weight settled against him on either side. The shock was enough to temporarily still his violent breaths. Gojo could tell by where they pressed into his shoulders that Yuuji sat on his left and Nobara on the right.
“Sensei. It’s fine.” Megumi’s voice was soft and measured.
Warm hands enveloped his own where they were still mercilessly trying to shove his eyes into the back of his skull. Megumi’s hands neither pulled nor tightened, simply rested in a silent plea, and how could Gojo not respond.
He forced the steel out of his shoulder, tried to relax his arms from the position they’d cemented into.
It must have been enough because the next thing he registered was each hand being guided to fold themselves over his knee. A strong and familiar hand settled on his crown, gently pushing his face down to be cradled on carefully arranged forearms so his eyes were simply resting against the soft fabric of his sleeves.
He thought Megumi would pull away but to his surprise the hand remained where it was, providing a steady warmth.
Gojo focused all his attention on the physical presence around him. The pressure of each digit in his hair, the minute movement accompany every rise and fall of Yuuji and Nobara’s chest.
Slowly, an eternity withdrew to lucid moments. The heaving pants that dominated the silence retreated to shallow inhales. What was once an all consuming conflagration of white yielded to blissful darkness.
Gojo forced a deep lungful of air to expand his chest, held onto it as his awareness resettled into order. His mind sheltered itself in the cocoon of warmth his students gifted, lashing pain dispelling itself into a dull ache.
Gingerly, he let his eyes open the barest sliver, narrowing the world to just his three student.
Megumi sat before him, broken leg sprawled at an awkward angle but adamantly refusing movement, hand glued to snowy locks. Nobara leaned her head against crumbling cement, poorly feigning disinterest. Yuuji, ever attentive, gently increased their contact as he leaned forward, brown eyes wide with concern.
Enough of that, what kind of irresponsible teacher etched such worried frowns on youths who had stood unblinking before death.
Gojo raised two fingers to tap Megumi’s wrist, a silent thanks and reassurance.
There was an audible exhale as the boy allowed his hand to relax, not without delivering a soft flick of admonishment on their drop down though. Mean, but not unwarranted.
Gojo didn’t quite trust words yet, so he leaned back and settled for a small but genuine upturn of lips.
As if a wire had been cut, all his students melted boneless into the rubble.
None spoke, letting placid silence mend what had strained and crack in the night. Yuuji slipped down to rest his head on Gojo’s shoulder while Nobara shifted to use him as a backrest. Megumi laid flat on his back, uninjured foot close enough to knock against his classmate’s.
It was impossible to gauge how long they languished in the stillness with only mellow breaths to count time.
...
...
...
“neh, Sensei.” Yuuji hummed, craning his neck to look up with eyebrows raised expectantly. “Did you remember the cheese tarts?” Gojo stared, then broke into howling laughter.
Really, what did he do to deserve these kids.
━◦○◦━◦○◦━◦○◦━◦○◦━◦○◦━◦○◦━
It was raining tonight, Fujimori Kazuhiro noted absently.
The man reached over the polished black wood of his table, lifting a stack of reports. He hummed absently as he leafed through the pages. A grade one sorcerer whose head had outgrown his skill and was trying to wheedle a place for himself in shaman politics. A grade two sorcerer who flipped her allegiance to back the Zen’ins.
The old man’s hand froze suspended as he flipped the next page.
Kazuhiro reached for his pipe with shaky hands. The fine wood of the instrument had been worn down from generations of hands, but the imprints only added to its refined quality. He flicked open the tobacco box and began pressing the reddish-brown leaves into the charred bowl of his pipe.
Kazuhiro’s hand stilled on the match box as a presence flared to life, dominating the room and smothering the night air.
“You figured everything out then.” Fujimori muttered. Barely audible, though he knew his audience of one could make out every word.
A strike brought the match to life and, with a few puffs, encouraged a glow of embers to settle in his pipe. He flicked the burning stub onto the damning pages before him, watching the pristine white curl and consume itself.
Not that it would do him any good now. A shame really, he thought as he exhaled his first breath of smoke, it was Igarashi’s birthday next week.
“It wasn’t personal, if you’d believe it. But you are aware my family’s position has long been maintained through monetary contributions. No decent jujutsu sorcerer has come from the Kazuhiro line in generations.” Another waft of smoke drifted to the ceiling.
“You’re simply too much of a liability, tearing up centuries of balance. And those blighted students of yours.” A warning flare of cursed energy met his words.
He sighed, “My grandson is their age you know, barely an ounce of cursed energy, yet so eager to carry on the Kazuhiro legacy. But there’s no place for someone like him at the head of the table in the world you’re building is there.”
He wishes he could have seen Igarashi one last time.
“I’ve been doing this a long time, but your operation was a special pain in the ass.” He gave a wry chuckle. “It took months to set up, bribing the right people, fooling the ones who couldn’t be bought. I was hoping to at least eliminate one of those young upstarts if killing you failed, but it looks like I couldn’t even manage that.” He wasn’t sure why the words kept pouring out, wasn’t sure he could stop them if he tried.
There was a frenetic energy in him now, as if every phrased breathed to life bought him another precious second in this world.
“The other elders won’t even speak the words assassination, though I’m sure all of them have entertained the thought. They think you can be leashed and controlled. You and I know better though. Keeping you around is like placing a grenade in the middle of your house thinking your hand is on the pin when it’s already been pulled.”
Kazuhiro blew a stream of grey through his nose, finally turning his head to look at the solitary figure hidden in the shadow of his entranceway. His aging eyes could barely make out the outline of the intruder’s white locks.
“Someone like you should never have been born. Gojo Satoru.”
“You were acting alone then.” Kazuhiro heard more than he saw the flutter of white bandages land onto his pristine wood floor. “That’s all I needed to confirm.”
The old man closed his eyes, breathing in a deep lungful of woody smoke, letting it settle and burn before releasing a final plume.
“A part of me thought you wouldn’t have the guts to actually do this.” He lifted his gaze away from the antique cradled in wrinkled palms to meet eyes that held a shattered sky.
“You should never have come after my students.”
The twisting tendril of smoke curling from the aged pipe blew out.